Even though I have publicly stated a fear of Facebook, I’m fascinated by Aaron Sorkin and David Fincher’s The Social Network. If you haven’t seen the movie, it captures Shakespearian levels of betrayal and ambition at a generation Millennial’s iambic pentameter. Vanity Fair, the New York Times, and the New Yorkerhave all given good reviews to the film balancing thought-provoking and entertaining. ﻿﻿I saw the movie opening night, but have only now digested its most disturbing quality. (Apologies–this post is so early October 2010.)

The movie is an action flick for the nerdier set with comic relief. I LOLed at various scenes, especially the ongoing background jokes between my alma mater Boston University and the esteemed Harvard. A rivalry that doesn’t even exist. In the opening scene a BU lady gets picked on for “not having homework,” but goes on to represent the only seemingly intelligent and likeable woman in the entire film.

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According to BU’s student newspaper the Daily Free Press, Sorkin said in an interview with the Boston Herald he has nothing against BU students–his sister was one. “Although the movie opens with a joke about BU girls, the BU girl may be the only class act in the movie.”

I’m not the only one who found the films portrayal of Coeds a bit too geeky, tech-groupie, Asian fantasy-like. Stephen Colbert lambasted Sorkin while he promoted the film on the Colbert Report in September. When talking about Zuckerberg’s faux BU girlfriend Colbert states,

“She’s super smart and she definitely gets the best of him–the other ladies don’t have as much to say, because they are high, or drunk, or fucking guys in the bathroom. Why are there no other women of any substance in the movie?”

﻿﻿﻿﻿I have personally observed enough “prizes” during my days and nights on BU’s Comm Ave to understand the sentiment. The Warren Towers “ZOO” was an excellent vantage point to observe other inhabitants’ behavior. Especially as I never technically lived there. But, this is not the most disturbing part of the film for me–there are flickers of brilliance and craziness and stupidity within all young women and men from any caliber University.

In retrospect, the aspect of the film that bothers me most was the fact that you never see Zuckerberg having a female friend. Fact or fiction? I don’t know. Was he was a loner without many platonic relationships, but with one steady girlfriend? Perhaps there really were no women involved in the founding of Facebook? Regardless, in this day and age, let’s hope during his truncated years in Cambridge he made one sensible opposite sex friend without benefits.

And if he couldn’t find a worthy one in Cambridge, he could have just crossed the River Charles.